401 



the other hand, if he walks on the heel a thick-toed and thin heeled 

 shoe must be woru. 



Since ringbone is considered to be one of the hereditary diseases no 

 animal suffering from this trouble should ever be used for breeding 

 purposes. 



LAMINITIS. 



By what term this disease was first known to man is a question 

 unanswerable. During many years in the recent past, and before an. 

 approximate knowledge of its lesions was had, it was usually desig- 

 nated as " founder." 



In country districts and amongst the great majority of the laity thia 

 name is yet almost exclusively used ; and undoubtedly it was first so 

 employed because it best expressed the physical inability or disinclina- 

 tion upon the part of the patient to proceed in his gait, resembling 

 thereby a ship similarly disabled. That it could have been adopted 

 upon any other ground hardly seems possible, for the etymology of the 

 term does not indicate that it was so used because it contained even the 

 most remote intimation either as to the seat of the disease, its nature 

 or its cause. 



Of the nature of laminitis but little is to be said, it being a simple 

 inflammation of the sensitive laminse of the feet, characterized by the 

 general phenomena attending inflammation of the skin and mucous 

 membranes, producing no constitutional disturbances except those de- 

 pendent upon the local disease, and having a strong tendency, in severe 

 cases, to destructive disorganization of the tissues affected. 



Causes. — The causes of laminitis are as wide and variable as in any 

 of the local inflammations, and may be divided into two classes — the 

 predisposing and exciting. 



Predisposing causes. — From personal observations I do not know that 

 any porticular construction of foot or any special breed of horses are 

 thereby predisposed to this disease, neither can I find anything to 

 warrant the assumption that it is in any way hereditary; so that while 

 we may easily cultivate a predisposition of the disease upon the part 

 of the tissues subject to become affected, the disease itself does not 

 originate without an exciting cause. Like most other tissues, a pre- 

 disposition to inflammation may be induced in the sensitive laminit by 

 any cause which lessens their power of withstanding the work im|)osed 

 on them. It exists to an extent in those animals unaccustomed to 

 work, particularly if they are plethoric, and in all those that have been 

 previous subjects of the disease, for the same rule holds good here that 

 we find in so many diseases — i. e., that one attack impairs the functional 

 activity of the affected tissues and thus renders them more easy of a 

 subsequent inflammation. 



Unusual excitement by determining an excessive blood supply, bad 

 shoeing, careless paring of the feet by removing the sole support, as 



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